


Errant

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: M/M, Roleswap, the greatest hate of all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-14
Updated: 2011-06-14
Packaged: 2017-10-20 10:02:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/211561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's a reason why nobody gave Dave's job to Karkat.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Errant

For a few moment after Karkat enters the game world, he allows himself to think that maybe, just _maybe_ , this whole Sgrub thing won’t dissolve into a thick, incestuous slurry of failure. It’s a vain hope, but it’s his, and he likes it. His lusus is sort of alive again. He’s done with fucking meteor bullshit. He’s got his sickles and some chumps to use them on.

Didn’t he always say that he was destined for great things?

Yes. Hell yes. Hell _fucking_ yes.

The fog is thick in Karkat’s new land, and the silence is even thicker. Sturdy grey asphalt cuts paths through a vast sea of mercury. The scenery is so surreal that it feels almost… comfortable. As though it were meant for him. Like he’s all wrapped up in sopor, waiting for the bad dreams to bleed away.

Then some douchebag appears out of fucking nowhere and punches Karkat in the face.

“What the fuck.” Karkat reels back, clutching at his nose. He can feel liquid on the palm of his hand, smell the briny tang of his own blood, and fuck his pathetic excuse for a life, if Terezi licks her screen right now he then is fucked sideways with a three-pronged culling fork.

But then, Karkat’s probably fucked anyway, because when he looks out from between his fingers, he sees his own stupid face glaring back at him.

“For fuck’s sake, don’t gawp around like a wriggler,” the other Karkat snaps.

Karkat isn’t sure how he knows that this is a future version of himself. He just does. It’s as obvious as the color of the sky.

“Terezi doesn’t find out about any of this,” Future Karkat continues. “She’s busy working out her own meteor bullshit. I can’t believe how self-centered you are.” Future Karkat pauses, considers the state of his knuckles, and then jams the pommel of his sickle into Karkat’s gut. “Welcome to the Medium. You are a maggot on the carcass of this world, and I hope you eat so much rot that you choke on it.”

“Oh fuck oh fuck what the _fuck_ ,” Karkat wheezes, with all of the incisive wit and eloquence that he has developed over sweeps of watching treasured cinema classics. His amazing skills kick in to keep him from falling on his ass.

“You already know what the fuck,” Future Karkat says. “We’re the Knight of Time.”

And okay, maybe Karkat knows that too – knows it like breath in his lungs and the beating of his own heart.

He takes a second to get a better look at Future Karkat and not at all to get his breath back, because that would be fucking stupid, he took that hit like a threshecutioner.

Wow, are the dark hollows under his eyes ever ugly. Was he always so fucking rounded? His teeth and his nails and his stupid rosy cheeks and fuck it, he has to face facts, his body is nothing but a collection of shitty nubs – a worthless sack of failed angles and sanded-down edges.

“Fuck you, Future Me,” Karkat says, before his thinkpan can catch up with his mouth. “You’ve really let yourself go.”

“Oh, have I?”

Karkat lunges forward to maybe, fuck, he doesn’t know, beat Future Karkat’s face in probably. Only Future Karkat is way ahead of him on that front, and does some kind of insane flowy grab-throw thing, which ends up with Karkat sprawling boneless on the ground.

“Fuck.”

Karkat sags resentfully back against the asphalt. He’s not sulking, or giving up. He’s just… regrouping, that’s all.

“You’re not going to listen to me, but I’ll tell you how it is anyway. That’s because I am so much better than you that I should be classified as a higher species,” Future Karkat informs him. "You should bow down and beg to suck my bulge in thanks for the incredible gift of my presence."

Karkat snorts. “Tell me what? That a terrible event is going to turn me into a condescending douchebag? Right. Got it. Warning from the crapsack future received. Can we move on now.”

Future Karkat is straddling him, and holds his wrists crushed painfully against the concrete. So no, Karkat guesses that they can’t move on, because he’s not strong enough to break Future Karkat’s hold, and the only reaction his struggles produce is a heavy-lidded look that he can’t decipher.

“You don’t lead them, and you never could have,” Future Karkat continues, rumbling with disdain, and Karkat can tell that he’s not lying, because he’s never been good at lying like that. “That’s the Witch of Blood’s job. She’s the fucking Empress, dumbass, what did you think was going to happen.”

“Oh, fuck that! This is my chance, and I’m not going to throw it away because you’ve decided to throw a bullshit party, and you couldn’t convince anyone else to attend.”

Future Karkat just stares back at him. Karkat breaks first, and looks away. Or maybe Karkat looks away because he can see that the other boy is already broken.

This is kind of scaring the shit out of him.

“I’m not going to tell you about how badly you fuck everything up, because let’s face it, we’d be here for sweeps.” Future Karkat leans closer, like _really_ up in Karkat’s face, and Karkat can feel the grubfucker’s breath against his collarbone. “All I’ll say is what you would already know if you weren’t the stupidest grub to ever crawl out of the brooding caverns. You’re outside the hemospectrum, and you’re outside of the standard timestream, and you’re not fucking part of their rainbow rumpus feelings pile. If you care about them, you’ll do what you have to do without touching them. I’m the only one you’ve got.”

“Fu—“

Karkat’s attempt to strike back with a hearty fuck you is parried with a harsh kiss, and oh shit, what is this even, he’s biting his own lip nails cutting half-moons into his own palms and it’s so slow and warm and awful that he feels like he could combust from the terrible sameness of it all.

“Well. Me, and those doomed timeline assholes.” Future Karkat corrects himself, a minute later. “But they’re not nearly as terrible as us. They at least have the decency to up and die when they’re no longer useful.”

Karkat hears music playing – a drumbeat, like a call to war– and then Future Karkat pops out of existence again. Leaving Karkat lying cold and alone on the pavement, with only a bad mood and a hard bulge to show for his troubles.

“Thanks for nothing, fuckass!” Karkat yells up at the clouds, before picking himself up, dusting himself off, and retrieving his weapon from his strife specibus. “Like I’m pathetic enough to give up as easily as you have.”

He needs to go find some more imps already. He’s going to need to alchemize some time gear, if he wants to take that sorry grubfucker down.


End file.
